Chronicles
Development & Operations Manager Griffin Cunningham shares his contemplative journey, and invites you to do the same.
Dear CCR community,
Over the past few months, I’ve been honored to connect with so many of you through our Sustenance Campaign. I’m filled with inspiration as I recall the stories you’ve shared—stories of gain and loss, courage, dedication, and transformation. It’s clear that Dr. Wallace and Dr. Natanya’s teachings have supported so many of you, in a variety of ways, on your paths toward genuine well-being.
And still: for every one of you I’ve met, there are twenty more members of this community that I haven’t. So, as the newest member of the CCR team, I wanted to take this opportunity to share a bit of my own story with you, and tell you more about my role at the CCR.
My story starts with disillusionment.
Disillusionment
It was a few weeks before my junior year of college. The afternoon sun was hot, shining through my window as I read Paramahansa Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi—my first real introduction to Eastern religion.
I laid the book on my chest. If true, the stories in this book would blow the lid off of my Catholic faith. For years, I had struggled to believe in the God described at Mass. My spiritual life was barren and directionless. But in the Autobiography, I read about yogis finding true peace in samadhi, over and over again. Their worldview and their practice had real results.
As I considered them, the benefits of meditation seemed to far outweigh my frustrating efforts to understand whether God was “real.” As far as I could tell, the latter task hadn’t made my life better. In fact, it had only increased my sense of guilt and anxiety.
From that moment, I decided to really explore the potentials of meditation. What was I missing out on? Could I really find peace within my own mind?
Refuge
As I dabbled in meditation and pushed the boundaries of my old beliefs, I put my refuge in “science”—at least, that’s what I told myself. I think I really meant logical thinking, which for me, was the polar opposite of blind belief. It wasn’t until I encountered Dr. Wallace that I realized these two—science and logical thinking—didn’t always sync up.
Despite my angst, Buddhism caught my attention. At first glance, it was the least “religious” religion I had ever encountered (in hindsight, this initial impression was of course reductionistic). Meditation was central, which I liked, and I found its philosophy both fresh and practical. I was hooked. Still aching for a coherent worldview, I applied for a Buddhist Studies program in Bodh Gaya, India.
The first weekend retreat broke me. It took a mere 48 hours of sitting with my own mind to realize that the Buddha’s teachings on suffering, arising, cessation, and path weren’t just compelling—they were true. In this experience, I got my first taste of refuge.
Soon after I got back from the program, I happened upon Dr. Wallace and Dr. Natanya’s work on YouTube. Their teachings spoke to me on both a practical and mystical level: I found my meditation practice vastly enriched by Dr. Wallace’s detailed instructions, and Dr. Natanya’s ability to interweave Christian and Buddhist teachings was astounding. In fact, I found her presentation of Christianity so inspiring that I decided to give Jesus and his teachings a wholehearted second try.
For the past five years, I’ve been on a journey of not only healing my relationship with Christianity, but diving into it with more intelligence and enthusiasm than ever before. And while it’s a bit ironic, the practices of shamatha and vipashyana as taught here at the CCR have been integral to my “coming home.” While my story continues to unfold, I know from experience that these practices have value far beyond their Buddhist origin.
My Role at the CCR
In 2022, I was very fortunate to attend the CCR’s inaugural Fathom the Mind. Heal the World. Retreat. It was truly one of the most profound and special weeks of my whole life. Transformed by my experiences there, I was determined to stay involved with the CCR however I could.
After two years of volunteering on various projects, I was honored to join the CCR full-time as Development & Operations Manager in the summer of 2024. While the title certainly covers a wide range of duties, at the core, I’m responsible for:
- Organizing and promoting events and other content, such as our Ghatika Monthly meditation sessions
- Spearheading new projects and initiatives, including an upcoming CCR podcast (more on this in the coming months…)
- Planning and executing fundraising campaigns like the Sustenance Campaign
- Deepening your connection with the CCR
Now let me linger on that last point. While most who have donated to the Sustenance Campaign have heard from me already, I want to reiterate my thanks for your generosity. Because of you, I can devote myself full-time to bringing the CCR’s message—and by extension, genuine well-being—to more and more people. I am so grateful for this opportunity, and I wouldn’t be able to help in advancing our mission without your support.
So, now that you know a little more about me, I’d love to hear from you. What’s your story, and how did you find us? What can we offer to help you on your journey toward genuine well-being? What are the impacts you want to see through the CCR? If you’re up for it, I’d love to discuss these questions and more with you. Send me a message at griffin.cunningham@centerforcontemplativeresearch.org—I look forward to getting to know you better.
Wishing you well,
Griffin Cunningham
Development & Operations Manager
Center for Contemplative Research
A CCR retreatant shares the benefits of her six-month retreat.
Dear CCR Community,
Earlier this year I completed my first six-month meditation retreat at the CCR hermitage Miyo Samten Ling in Crestone, and it is a great pleasure to share with you a little bit about myself and the profound experience that these intense months of retreat have been for me, hoping that this short testimony may be useful and inspiring for your practice.
Ever since I was a teenage girl I had been asking myself who we are, and where we come from, and then seeking answers to these questions by persistently searching my mind to discover dimensions of my past life. At that time I had never practiced meditation, and yet I instinctively knew that it was in the space of the mind, through introspection, that I could find the answers to those questions, but after a while my concentration would falter and I would get lost in that dark and empty space. And my search stopped—I couldn’t find the answers.
After working in advertising and media for almost thirty years, it was meeting Lama Alan Wallace that convinced me to leave my job and retire early to have the time to attend his eight-week meditation retreats. I was fortunate enough to be accepted into one of the first eight-week shamatha retreats in Phuket in 2011, and since then I have attended every eight-week retreat, either in person or online when it was not possible to attend in person. The teachings I received from Lama Alan, and the study of them along with contemplation and meditative practice, have been a source of profound inspiration and spiritual and personal growth. During these same years I had begun to volunteer in the nonprofit sector, co-founding a charity to support the establishment of a nunnery school in Nepal, which is still thriving.
I set aside several months each year for solitary meditation retreats. The months spent in solitude, contemplation, and meditation were an indelible experience, a source of profound insight and peace that I remember as moments of grace, priceless gifts, and blessings. Meditation on the Four Immeasurables allowed me to gain insight into the lack of boundaries between myself and others, and to generate great compassion for every aspect of the human condition. The teachings on dependent origination and meditation on the nature of mind, where the imaginary differences between me and others dissolved, left room for a feeling of loving-kindness and compassion. Listening to and contemplating Lama Alan’s commentaries on the texts of Dudjom Lingpa and other masters of the Dzogchen tradition was like the air I breathed, and I found in them the deepest answers to my spiritual quest.
This past year, the conditions were finally right for me to come to Crestone and do an intensive six-month meditation retreat without interruption.The months I spent in the peace and natural beauty of Miyo Samten Ling, immersed in meditation and the study of the Dharma teachings, surrounded by the loving presence and care of the other retreatants and teachers, were extremely beneficial and deeply meaningful. They were months of solitude, silence, spiritual growth, and deep joy. I never felt alone. The beauty of nature and the richness of the teachings I received were a constant nourishment for my deepest mind.
My time in Crestone flew by, and I had to return to Italy to attend to all that normal, everyday life throws at me. But in my heart remained the wonderful qualities I had cultivated in the six months of the retreat: a deep sense of gentleness, patience, calmness, and more clarity in dealing with every situation. These are qualities that enrich not only my life, but also the lives of the people I come into contact with and those who live around me.
Sometimes I am still amazed at how much my inner transformation affects others. When this happens—when I see the release of tension, worry, and suffering in others because of this process of spiritual transformation and healing of my mind—I feel great joy and wonder and the wish that all beings may be free from suffering and its causes spontaneously fills my heart.
My deepest gratitude goes to my root teacher Lama Alan who made this possible by guiding me on the Dharma path, for giving me the opportunity to come to the CCR in Crestone, and for offering me the opportunity to return to Miyo Samten Ling to continue my retreat.
My love and deep gratitude goes also to the teachers and community of Miyo Samten Ling for their affection, unwavering care, and support. May the aspirations of Lama Alan and the project of the CCRs flourish throughout the world and bring about a revolution in the science of mind to heal the world.
—Francesca
Dr. Nicholas J. Matiasz explains the CCR's unique, rigorous approach to contemplative science, featured in a new Routledge Handbook
Dear CCR Community,
As the CCR’s Scientific Program Director, I’m delighted to share an update with you today on an important contribution the CCR has made to the field of contemplative science. This past September, Routledge published its first Handbook of Research Methods in Spirituality and Contemplative Studies, for which Dr. B. Alan Wallace and I contributed a chapter. Today, I’m writing to share with you the key ideas of that chapter, which describes some of the core elements of the CCR’s approach to contemplative science.
A revolutionary mission with an orthodox foundation
While the CCR’s mission may seem unorthodox at first glance, our work is thoroughly grounded in principles that are foundational to all branches of scientific research—including the principle of convergence:
The principle of convergence:
It is typically more persuasive to obtain convergent evidence across multiple lines of inquiry, as opposed to seeking only consistent evidence within a single line of inquiry.
(This idea is also called evidential triangulation, or the variety-of-evidence thesis.)
What does this principle look like in practice? Many of you are likely familiar with the process of a jury trial, in which lawyers present a wide variety of evidence to support their arguments. Eyewitness testimony is certainly crucial, but a prosecutor’s argument is even more convincing when augmented with forensic evidence, surveillance footage, and expert witnesses. Arguments that include evidence from a variety of sources are more likely to be true.
Scientists employ the principle of convergence in a similar way. While we certainly need to create replicable experiments to confirm our findings, relying on results from a single kind of experiment alone is like calling the same witness to the stand to hear their testimony over and over again. When we fail to support our findings through multiple sources of evidence, we may not get the full picture. But testing a hypothesis with multiple distinct methods can guard against biases and other deficiencies that may exist in any one method.
For instance, scientists employ the principle of convergence today by combining interventional and observational studies to observe a particular system. When scientists intervene on a system to test its effect, their intervention may have unintended consequences that make it difficult to accurately interpret the results. Scientists therefore complement interventional experiments with purely observational studies, in which they simply observe the system without any explicit intervention. The combination of interventional and observational approaches is just one example of how scientists apply the principle of convergence across different streams of evidence, creating a fuller, more accurate picture of what they study.
A New Chapter in Contemplative Science
The principle of convergence is a main theme of our newly published book chapter, titled “Contemplative Science: Expanding the Scope of Empiricism to Increase the Convergence of Evidence.” The chapter describes how professional contemplatives can provide a more comprehensive understanding of both consciousness and genuine well-being by contributing rigorous first- and second-person data:
- We define first-person data from contemplatives as “reports that contemplatives give regarding their experiences and insights.”
- We define second-person data as “assessments of contemplatives’ meditative abilities or other psychological and physical traits, which can be offered by other professionals–including psychologists, psychiatrists, clinicians, or other contemplatives.”
Professionally trained contemplatives can therefore increase the very possibility for convergent evidence by providing these additional streams of evidence. This first- and second-person data can then be integrated—and potentially converge—with the traditional third-person measures of modern science, such as electroencephalogram (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI).
Realizing the full potential of contemplative science
One of the truly unprecedented outcomes of this approach is that professional contemplatives will no longer be regarded simply as subjects, or participants, in other scientists’ protocols—akin to untrained undergrads, for example, who might occasionally choose to volunteer for psychological studies at their universities.
Instead, professional contemplatives who have completed years of rigorous training must be regarded as true colleagues to their scientific collaborators. This new role allows contemplatives not only to help design the research itself but also to be acknowledged for their ability to make genuine discoveries. As contemplative science continues to develop, it is essential for researchers, especially those steeped in the Western scientific tradition, to overcome the ethnocentrism that has, until now, denied contemplatives an equal role in scientific discussions.
Objectivity as intersubjective verification
To be sure, none of these developments is in any way an invitation to dispense with objectivity in science, even though we are advocating for first-person methods. The reason our approach does not depart from this scientific ideal is that objectivity has always been based on intersubjective verification, or agreement. That is, each scientist, firmly rooted in their subjective perspective on reality, must communicate with colleagues—who each have their own perspectives—to identify the aspects of their experiences that seem to be invariant across perspectives (another form of convergence). The stories we tell about these invariant features of reality therefore compose what we refer to as “objective reality.” Of course, a great deal of training is typically required to participate meaningfully in this process of intersubjective verification—as is the case with mathematicians’ evaluation of a proof, for example. The same is certainly true in the case of contemplative insights and discoveries.
In the West, such ideas go back at least as far as Bertrand Russell’s early-20th-century writings; and in the East, they go back at least as far as the Buddha’s teachings. Bertrand Russell makes a distinction between knowledge by acquaintance and knowledge by description, as discussed in his 1912 book The Problems of Philosophy. He argues that any time we describe something that exists, we necessarily do so in reference to “sense-data.” (bold emphasis mine):
“We shall say that we have acquaintance with anything of which we are directly aware, without the intermediary of any process of inference or any knowledge of truths. Thus in the presence of my table I am acquainted with the sense-data that make up the appearance of my table—its colour, shape, hardness, smoothness, etc.; all these are things of which I am immediately conscious when I am seeing and touching my table.
My knowledge of the table as a physical object, on the contrary, is not direct knowledge. Such as it is, it is obtained through acquaintance with the sense-data that make up the appearance of the table. We have seen that it is possible, without absurdity, to doubt whether there is a table at all, whereas it is not possible to doubt the sense-data. My knowledge of the table is of the kind which we shall call ‘knowledge by description’. The table is ‘the physical object which causes such-and-such sense-data’. This describes the table by means of the sense-data. In order to know anything at all about the table, we must know truths connecting it with things with which we have acquaintance…”
Now compare Russell’s words to those of the Buddha, who explains that our sense faculties—including, crucially, our faculty of mental perception—serve as the basis for descriptions of everything that can be said to exist (Sabba Sutta, SN 35:23):
[The Buddha said,] “And what, bhikkhus [monks], is the all? The eye and forms, the ear and sounds, the nose and odors, the tongue and tastes, the body and tactile objects, the mind and mental phenomena. This is called the all.
If anyone, bhikkhus, should speak thus: ‘Having rejected this all, I shall make known another all’—that would be a mere empty boast on his part. If he were questioned he would not be able to reply and, further, he would meet with vexation. For what reason? Because, bhikkhus, that would not be within his domain.”
What I take from these quotations is that scientists can maximize their objectivity precisely by understanding their own subjectivity, to know thyself, exactly as the Delphic oracle advised. To explain reality is to explain how it is that we see reality. As we state in the new chapter, all empirical inquiry is therefore “inescapably perspectival.”
If our subjective experiences form the foundation of how we understand the world around us, then our ability to refine our sense faculties directly determines how far we can push the boundaries of empirical and scientific inquiry. This constraint on scientific inquiry is precisely why contemplative science requires the development of contemplative technology: contemplatives cultivate advanced degrees of meditative concentration, like an astronomer who polishes the lens of their telescope, enabling reliable, high-resolution observations.
Practical implementation through mind labs
The conceptual framework we outline in our chapter is not merely theoretical or academic—it serves as the foundation for the practical work we do through our Mind Labs, Research, and Education programs, which employ these concepts in real-world settings. As we will begin the new year with a cohort of 13 contemplatives-in-training from six countries, the CCR’s Mind Lab program aims to demonstrate both the feasibility and utility of career paths in contemplative science. And as the CCR’s Pilot Study continues, now in its 47th month, we’re employing a novel research protocol that exemplifies the possibilities for evidential convergence central to our Research program.
How to access the chapter
For those interested, the entire chapter is currently available to read in the book preview on the Routledge website—follow the link and then click the “Preview Book” button, beneath the book’s thumbnail.
We believe this handbook entry will help researchers understand the full potential of contemplative science, envisioning it not just as the application of neuroscience tools on meditators, but as a broader use of contemplative methods to gain experiential insight into the nature of reality—a vision articulated by Dr. Wallace in 1986, when he coined the term “contemplative science” in his undergraduate honors thesis.
If you find this work inspiring, I encourage you to share this newsletter with others who may be interested in our work. You can also follow the link above to read the full chapter, or consider supporting our ongoing initiatives.
With gratitude for your interest and support,
Scientific Program Director
Center for Contemplative Research
Dr. Natanya explains the importance of authentic contemplative insight for a full understanding of both mind and reality.
Dear CCR Community,
Throughout history, there have been individuals—and communities of individuals—who withdrew from what they recognized to be the confusion, darkness, and even hopelessness of their times to seek a deeper and everlasting dimension of reality, one that can be known from within the silence of a mind truly at rest.
In our present times, many luminaries have spoken of the crucial importance of the contemplative witness to a life of simplicity, humility, purity, kindness, generosity, prayer, and the steady cultivation of genuine well-being and wisdom.
But why should the contemplative training and way of life be so important when chaos abounds and there are so many crises in the world that call for our active, compassionate responses?
Here at the Miyo Samten Ling Hermitage of the CCR, we hold a very high standard for the name “contemplative,” a standard based in the 2,500-year-old Buddhist traditions of India and Tibet.
We use the term “contemplative” to translate the Sanskrit term yogin, which in its core Buddhist meaning refers to someone whose meditative concentration has reached a depth where he or she no longer perceives phenomena as possessing real characteristics from their own side. That is, a yogin’s mind is united with reality as it is, free of conceptual impositions.
It can be relatively easy to talk about phenomena not existing in the way that they appear, but it is another thing entirely to dwell in a state of unwavering meditation and realize experientially how all phenomena come into existence in dependence upon the mind, and that the mind itself is unlimited, vaster than space, and infinite in potential.
Contemplative insight into the nature of the mind and reality as a whole stands in direct opposition to the predominant modern view that mind is simply a byproduct of matter and that the objective universe exists independently of consciousness.
Typically, it takes tens of thousands of hours of meditation, cultivated over many years, to approach that kind of stability of mind unified with profound, experiential insight.
But someone trained as that kind of contemplative sees something about reality that most ordinary people cannot see; or at least cannot see consistently. And that seeing, that wisdom, can be the key to resolving catastrophic problems in our world—primarily when qualified contemplatives train others in time-tested methods for achieving exceptional mental balance. Such mental balance serves as the foundation for experiencing unprecedented dimensions of genuine well-being and gaining the ability to help heal the world and all its inhabitants from the many ills that beset humanity today, which we have inflicted upon ourselves.
Contemplative training begins with listening to teachings; it continues with applying our full intelligence to evaluating those teachings intellectually and experientially; and it comes to its culmination and final fruition through the ever-deepening practice of meditation, to open the heart and illuminate the mind.
Contemplatives-in-training come to Miyo Samten Ling already prepared with years of experience in listening, reflection, and also daily meditation. Some come initially for a retreat of 2–3 months in order to become accustomed to the experience of retreat—practicing throughout the day to further integrate teachings they have received prior to entering retreat.
Others immerse themselves in a retreat of six months to a year, testing their mettle in extended solitude and silence, dredging and purifying their psyches from the depths, and gaining life-transforming experiences in the process. Still others, who are totally dedicated to the contemplative way of life as their vocation, commit to open-ended retreats of many years. Among these, some will eventually complete a rigorous training in both theory and practice that will equip them not only as contemplatives with significant personal experience but also as teachers qualified to guide others through even the most advanced and challenging levels of practice.
Like graduate students who commit to a PhD program of 6-8 years in length in order to hone and demonstrate the skills needed to be considered a professional in their respective fields, long-term contemplatives-in-training will eventually proceed through a series of oral and written examinations assessing their full integration of theory and practice along the path to perfect enlightenment.
In keeping with Buddhist tradition, contemplatives will share the details of their meditative experience only with their personal spiritual mentors and in the rigorous context of confidential scientific studies, but will never be asked to talk about such private experience with others. Their qualifications as teachers and guides will be based on their demonstrated knowledge of the teachings and their maturity as practitioners flourishing in compassion, pure ethics, and exceptional mental balance, as well as contemplative realizations discussed only in private.
Such graduating contemplatives may then choose either to remain primarily in solitude, continuing in their contemplative way of life to achieve higher and higher realizations, or they may return to an active, socially engaged way of life, sharing their knowledge and insights in the field of education, with adults in all walks of life, and with other aspiring contemplatives.
Those who have achieved a high degree of meditative concentration imbued with insight into the nature of reality might well be termed “professional contemplatives,” ready to engage in formal research as contemplative scientists in their own right, at times in collaboration with physicists, psychologists, and neuroscientists. More on that topic to come soon…
We invite you to join us in supporting those courageously committed to the rigors and challenges of contemplative training, which is primarily carried out in solitude and silence within a community of like-minded practitioners. Humanity will rely on such realized contemplatives to become the heroes of tomorrow, when civilization will need their depths of insight and wellsprings of kindness more urgently than ever before in human history.
With abounding gratitude for your faith and generosity,
Co-Founder & Hermitage Director
Center for Contemplative Research
Taking you inside day-to-day operations at Miyo Samten Ling Hermitage
Last week, we shared some of the transformative experiences that our full-time contemplatives have had in retreat at Miyo Samten Ling Hermitage.
Experiences like these come from deep, consistent practice over the span of months and years. And as one learns quickly in retreat, it’s impossible to maintain such continuity in practice without the support of others.
That’s where Sitatara and Aaron come in, as our resident caretakers.
At the CCR, we have learned a great deal during our first few years of hosting long-term retreatants engaged in contemplative science. Sitatara and Aaron have worked with heartfelt commitment to provide a scaffold for retreatant flourishing, and to continuously improve our processes as we learn together.
Help with the unexpected
Imagine you’re in retreat. As you start to make breakfast after morning practice, you realize the electric burner doesn’t work.
If you were on your own, it could take days to fix the issue. You’d probably have to make multiple phone calls, schedule a repair visit, come up with a new meal plan in the meantime, and maybe even foot the bill for a whole new stove.
Not ideal for mind training practices that rely on minimizing distraction and external engagement.
But when one of our retreatants faced this exact issue, they didn’t have to worry.
They reached out to Aaron through established mechanisms that honor silence, and within hours, he was able to check the range, determine the problem, and make a repair plan. What could have been a huge disturbance for this retreatant’s continuity in practice was a minor bump in the road.
Safe solitude amid nature
The broken stove is just one example of Aaron clearing the path for our retreatants, allowing them to practice without distraction. Some other obstacles that Aaron has taken care of include:
- Failed water heaters
- Plumbing issues, including broken faucets and leaking pipes
- Nonviolent pest control (catching mice and wasp nests and releasing them in the countryside)
- Fixing leaks
On top of these emergency responses, Aaron handles the cumbersome but necessary maintenance required for homes in remote Colorado, including:
- Fire preparedness (clearing brush, chimney cleaning, checking fire extinguishers)
- Bringing buildings up to code to meet insurance requirements
- Septic management
- Firewood sourcing
- Snowplowing and shoveling
- Finding the right local experts to help with fixes
Because Aaron manages all of this work, our retreatants live free from the anxieties and responsibilities of managing a retreat dwelling, while reaping all of the benefits.
If you feel so moved, please consider donating to our general fund to support the solitude and serenity of our retreatants. We are so grateful for your support in our shared mission!
A rare window into the transformation and insights that are possible through dedicated mind training.
Periodically, we ask our long-term retreatants in Crestone for anonymous feedback about their experiences in retreat. Their stirring responses offer a rare window into the transformation and insights that are possible through dedicated mind training.
Today, we share some of these reflections from long-term retreatants, whose experiences are made possible through your generous support.
To address the existential crises of the twenty-first century and turn toward a truly life-sustaining society, humanity needs the experience of mental balance that can come from the internal cultivation of genuine well-being, which gradually loosens the allure of a life dominated by fleeting distractions. CCR retreatants train and collaborate to help make this possible and available to our world, in our time.
One CCR meditator shares that extensive practice of mind-training techniques can generate a profound shift in needs:
“[I realized] how material desires, or external needs, are diminished when the mind is calm and when it knows itself… How simply we can live when there is genuine inner contentment and fulfillment.”
And another described retreat as a catalyst for sanity and serenity:
A journey towards healing and wisdom, through which one develops mental sanity and serenity, that progressively reveals deeper and truer aspects of one’s being and of reality itself, untapped resources (like courage, fortitude, patience), and an opening of the heart to depths of love and compassion previously unconceivable. A journey through which, inevitably, revolutionary emotional and psychological transformation takes place, catalyzing changes in all aspects of one’s life and relationships.
Retreat is not easy. Being alone with one’s mind in meditation for 5–12 hours every day, as CCR retreatants are, can unearth challenges to be faced and released. Retreat is thus an opportunity to break lifelong patterns of rumination:
Retreat has helped me become less convinced by the heartbreaking stories about my life that have been stuck on a superhighway of habitual rumination. It is easier now to recognize these same stories and avoid their hooks. The same feels true for mental afflictions in general, including the oscillation between anxiety and depression (with or without the storyline) that has created a baseline for experience throughout much of my life.
Without getting wrangled into their seemingly static stories, greater relaxation is accomplished—for without the exhaustion of gripping so tightly to these afflictions, I feel increasingly more relaxed. (It’s funny how the mind so badly wants ground that it will stand on hot coals or shards of glass in order to obtain any variety of familiar comfort!) Increased letting go encourages a deeper relaxation; with a deeper relaxation comes a greater acceptance and, therefore, transformation.
No longer being held onto so tightly, afflictions dynamically arise and release on their own, without my need to interfere or try to fix them.
Some contemplatives-in-training have found that their time in isolation positively transformed their external and interactive capacities:
[I’ve experienced an] emotional evolution, or revolution, of uncovering the potential for boundless love, compassion, and equanimity you never knew you had.
_____
I’ve become a little quieter and more thoughtful, more grateful and more loving.
_____
I can perceive a more equanimous and patient way of dealing with adversities on a daily basis, that turns into a more peaceful mind and state of being.
And when asked what their most significant insight had been, another retreatant described a dawning understanding of inseparability:
The knowledge that the primordial, true nature of all beings is Love (unceasing, uncreated, without a giver or a receiver, boundaries or divisions) inseparable from Emptiness (the formless creative force that is all forms).
That in this Love/Emptiness there is no separation, no difference between one and others. Knowing all living beings as manifestations of Love in action/form, opens you to experience profound compassion and gives rise to true equanimity.
Though the mission to fathom the mind and heal the world is long-term by nature, our retreatants are plumbing the possibilities here and now.
Thank you so much for nourishing the potential for the CCR to share contemplative methods and findings. In doing so, you move the world one step closer to a new era of human flourishing.
How B. Alan Wallace pushed the boundaries of Western science by investigating ancient contemplative technology.
Today, “contemplative science” is often described as simply the scientific study of meditation, relying heavily on the tools of neuroscience and psychology to measure how meditative practices affect the brain and behavior. Missing from this conception is an acknowledgement that meditative practices themselves might be employed as tools to reveal useful scientific knowledge about the world.
As a parallel, imagine if astronomy merely comprised the study of telescopes — never relying on these powerful instruments to make verifiable observations about celestial objects.
To understand how the field known as “contemplative science” can reach its full potential, we would do well to consult the man who coined the term himself: CCR co-founder Dr. B. Alan Wallace.
In 1984, Dr. Wallace enrolled at Amherst College to finish his undergraduate degree after a 14-year hiatus from Western education, during which he was ordained as a Buddhist monk. When His Holiness the Dalai Lama (who was Wallace’s preceptor) came to visit Amherst in the autumn of that same year, he encouraged Wallace to continue his studies in both physics and Buddhist Madhyamika philosophy. Wallace took His Holiness’s advice to heart, and in the winter of 1986, he submitted a 500-page honors thesis to his faculty readers, Prof. Arthur Zajonc and Prof. Robert Thurman. It was in this thesis, titled Words of Emptiness: A Centrist View of Science and Reality that the words “contemplative science” were set in print for the first time.
You can read our expanded definition of contemplative science here, but when Wallace wrote about it in his thesis, he defined it as “the phenomenological study of physical and cognitive events” (p. 285). Still, Wallace hardly believed he was inventing a new branch of science on his own. As he wrote later, “At present we lack such a science in the West, but it would be rash to conclude that it has been developed nowhere else” (p.301).
Wallace points us to the East — ancient India, to be precise — as the birthplace of contemplative science. It was there that sadhus perfected the art of meditative quiescence (also known as shamatha in the Buddhist tradition). Though extremely impressive, the profound stabilization and clarification of mental awareness that occurs with shamatha meditation is not the pinnacle of contemplative science. From the Buddhist perspective, the purpose of stabilizing one’s mind to such a degree is to make reliable and replicable observations about the nature of reality itself. As Wallace writes (p. 302, emphasis added):
The empirical methods of “contemplative research” presented as part of the Centrist [Madhyamika] View in Buddhism lead one to a direct realization of the nature of phenomena as dependently related events. This approach does not entail quantitative analysis or theory couched in mathematical terms; but it does, nevertheless, address many of the fundamental ontological issues that are being investigated in the context of the foundations of modern physics.”
In the decades since Wallace submitted his 1986 thesis, the term “contemplative science” has increasingly entered the mainstream; entire university centers and institutes now include the phrase in their titles. But to realize the full benefit that can come from collaboration between contemplatives and modern scientists, the CCR is implementing the approach proposed in the document that gave us the term itself. This approach is defined by two main attributes: (1) contemplatives are regarded as colleagues, not simply study subjects, with respect to their scientific collaborators, and (2) both ancient and modern methods are used to intersubjectively investigate the mind and its relationship to the world.
To learn more about our approach to contemplative science, visit our Research Overview page, or read our essays, “The Nature of Contemplative and Scientific Discoveries” and “A New Paradigm for Science and Religion in the Twenty-First Century.”
Enhancing the experience of our contemplatives-in-training.
On September 23, 2023, nine hearty and generous volunteers spent the day at the Miyo Samten Ling hermitage building a meditation walking trail on the south end of our 110-acre property. This trail will give our full-time contemplatives and guests more access to walking space on our land, and while this might seem like a relatively small upgrade, those in retreat can attest to its powerful impact. With this trail, our full-time contemplatives can now get fresh air and experience nature without meeting cars or neighbors on public roads, providing even more protection for the precious silence of retreat. In the future, we plan to install seating under some very special trees on the property to create spaces for comfortable outdoor meditation.
We are so grateful to our volunteers, who, in a matter of hours, helped us complete the work that would have taken us days on our own. The CCR has many other projects in process, ranging from landscaping work to fundraising. If you feel moved to volunteer your time with the CCR, please send us an email at info@centerforcontemplativeresearch.org. We would love to hear from you!
A foundational concept for our work at the CCR.
In ancient India, a ghatika was a standardized length of time (similar to our modern minutes and hours), and was often measured using a “ghatika yantra,” or a water clock. A single ghatika is 24 minutes in length, or one-sixtieth of a 24-hour day. CCR co-founder Dr. B. Alan Wallace has long emphasized one ghatika as an ideal length of time for a meditation session, a recommendation which has historical precedent:
“A session of twenty-four minutes is a good starting interval; for most people, it is neither too short nor too long … and this is the session duration that the eighth-century Indian Buddhist contemplative Kamalashila recommended for beginning meditators.”
– B. Alan Wallace, Minding Closely: The Four Applications of Mindfulness
In this video, Dr. Wallace explains the ghatika in-depth and offers suggestions on choosing the duration of a meditation session.
Join us for our Ghatika Monthly Meditation Sessions: The CCR hosts a “Ghatika Monthly” session on the second Saturday of every month. These sessions include a talk, 24-minute guided meditation, and Q&A portion. Join online or in-person for this opportunity to connect with the CCR’s certified teachers, as well as the global CCR community.
Sign up here to receive Ghatika Monthly announcements and session recordings.
A world-renowned musician shares his art and the Dharma.
In September of 2023, the CCR invited the Crestone community into Miyo Samten Ling Hermitage for a concert and Dharma talk from renowned Tibetan flute player and Grammy nominee Nawang Khechog. Despite hosting over 100 members of the Crestone community, the “Sounds of Peace” concert lived up to its name. As Nawang played his impressive variety of traditional instruments – some of which he had made himself – one could hear a pin drop in Manjushri Chapel.
Watch “Sounds of Peace” on YouTube.
“Sounds of Peace” was the first public event held at Miyo Samten Ling Hermitage (formerly known as Nada Hermitage) since the CCR moved in three years ago. Father Eric Haarer, a member of the Carmelite community that resided at Nada for nearly 40 years, offered a poignant introduction for the event. As the Carmelites themselves aged and their numbers dwindled, they came to the hard decision to sell their property.
“We just kept hoping and praying that the right group would come to us,” Fr. Eric said. Though having met with many prospective buyers, when Drs. B. Alan Wallace and Eva Natanya had an impromptu stay at the hermitage, something clicked.
“We fell in love with Lama Alan, and he fell in love with this property. And we felt immediately that this is the group. We had a deep intuition.” Three years on, Fr. Eric said that their prayers for a group that respected solitude, silence, and the sacredness of the land had been “answered in spades” in the CCR.
Nawang also offered touching words to the Crestone community, pausing his musical performance to give a Dharma talk on the “Eight Verses for Training the Mind,” a short but indispensable mind training text in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition. Nawang recounted receiving oral instructions on this text from Khunu Lama Rinpoche – a modern day bodhisattva whose very laughter cut through to Nawang’s heart. Punctuated by lighthearted laughter of his own, Nawang shared stories from his life and the great masters of Tibet as he described the importance of cultivating bodhicitta.
Nawang also shared the joy he felt when he realized Dr. Wallace had written multiple books on mind training, saying: “If you want to be a bodhisattva, it’s all there. You have all the teachings in this beautiful Dharma center. You have one of the best teachers here, Alan Wallace.”
The CCR was delighted to offer this event as a gift to the Crestone community, which we feel extremely fortunate to be a part of. As we continue our work, we hope to offer even more to our neighbors and the world at large in the form of monthly meditation sessions led by our resident teachers, special lectures, and publications from our research in contemplative science.
